The Zero Option

by David Rollins

  ‘No, he did not.’

  The crease that suddenly and momentarily appeared between Grundy’s eyes informed Lana that she’d touched a nerve. ‘Are you sure?’ she pressed.

  Sherwood raised an eyebrow at him.

  ‘I can’t tell you what I don’t know, okay?’ said Grundy, openly exasperated.

  ‘Grundy, leaving your license aside for a moment, we’re talking about a matter of national security, which means we can bring a whole suite of laws to bear, some of which hold the Bill of Rights at arm’s length.’ Lana didn’t want to have to use threats, especially ones they couldn’t enforce, but they were low on options.

  ‘I still don’t know anything about a tape. Like I said, these days all I know a lot about is drinks.’

  ‘How about Tex Mitchell? You seen him lately?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Know where we could find him?’

  ‘Nope, no idea. Sorry.’

  Lana stared at him. They weren’t going to get any further.

  ‘Thanks for minding my stuff, Jerry,’ a woman called out, bouncing in through the front door. She was tall and slim with strawberry blonde hair cut in a bob. She ducked under the bar, pulled out a bag and headed back to the front door. Jerome gave her a brief wave and said, ‘See you later, Tiff.’

  ‘Who’s Tiff?’ Agent Sherwood enquired, animated at last.

  Lana’s face felt hot. She didn’t need to ask, and they were starting to go round in circles. ‘Thank you for your time, sir,’ she said. She left some bills on the counter and walked out.

  Her cell began to ring as she ran across the road to the car. She answered the call as she fumbled with the umbrella and the car door. ‘Hello, Englese.’

  ‘Lana? Saul Kradich.’

  ‘Hey . . .’

  ‘Where are you? The static’s awful.’

  ‘That’s not static, it’s rain. Hang on . . .’ She closed the door and threw the soaked umbrella in the back seat. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘You still in Florida?’

  ‘Yeah, why?’

  ‘You asked me to look out for the license plate on Tex Mitchell’s car.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Well, nothing’s come up, and I mean nothing. Does he have a garage? If so, you might want to check inside it.’

  Sherwood opened the door and let in a bucket of water.

  ‘We did,’ said Lana, annoyed. ‘The vehicle’s not there. He might have swapped plates on us.’

  ‘Try enlisting the local PD and see what they come up with—get some boots on the street. The Feds have zip.’

  ‘Thanks for the advice. That it?’

  ‘No. Impatient today, aren’t we?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘As you’re still in the retirement state, there’s something you might like to look into. There’s a webzine I subscribe to called e-Fuzz. It specializes in high-end dweebs, of which, I guess, I’m one. The zine tackles complex computer and electronics problems. In the latest issue, just out, there’s an article titled, “The Awesome Architecture of Analog Algorithms”. The example used was the encryption algorithm for the Raytheon AN/SPS-32.’

  ‘Saul, in English, please, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘The SPS-32 was the radar used by the Chosa Besshitsu station at Wakkanai in the early eighties. There’s no by-line on the article, but e-Fuzz’s owner is a former NSA SIGINT spook by the name of Lucas Watts. Oh, and one more point worth mentioning: Watts flew with Tex Mitchell out of Shemya. These days he lives in Florida, a place called Port Charlotte.’

  Lana’s phone beeped.

  ‘That’ll be his address. I’ve just SMS-ed it to you.’

  ‘Saul, that’s great.’

  ‘Here to help.’

  ‘Before I go, one more thing.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘I want to know who was read-in on KAL 007.’

  ‘No can do.’

  ‘What’s it worth to you?’

  ‘What’s it worth to you?’

  ‘What would you say if I told you I just recorded that proposition? Are you open to being bribed?’

  ‘Oh, come on—that’s not playing by the rules.’

  ‘I want everything you can give me on 007—everything on the crash. I also want copies of any transcripts taken during the psych evaluations for Major Curtis Foxx—the actual transcriptions of the interviews, if you can get them. I want the ICAO report on the crash, as well as everything you can give me on the Chosa Besshitsu facility at Wakkanai. But most of all, I want to know who was read-in.’

  ‘Jesus . . .’

  ‘Here to help—didn’t you just say that?’

  ‘Did you really record my proposition?’

  ‘Would you like me to play it back?’

  ‘Alright . . . I’ll see what I can do.’

  February 7, 2012

  Moscow, Russia. Akiko and Ben entered the elevator and she pressed ‘0’ for ground. The doors closed, and then opened on the next floor down to let in another hotel guest, an elegant woman in her early fifties wearing a white-spotted ushanka, knee-length black leather coat and black high-heeled boots with gold buckles. Moscow chic. She leaned in front of Akiko and pressed a button.

  ‘We get out at next floor,’ she said unexpectedly, her voice Russian-accented, her singsong tone belying the directness of the command. Demonstrating that this was no idle request, she showed Akiko and then Ben the pearl handle of a compact pistol in her coat pocket. ‘Do not play game with me,’ she warned Ben. ‘Bullet will beat man—always.’

  Ben nodded, eyes wide. He had no idea what she thought he might do.

  The elevator doors opened. ‘There is guest sitting room around corner,’ the woman said, indicating the direction with a tilt of her head. ‘Go there.’

  The hallway was empty of other guests and hotel staff, between the morning and lunchtime shifts.

  Akiko led the way into the guest lounge.

  ‘Sit,’ the woman commanded.

  Akiko and Ben sat.

  ‘What do you want?’ Ben asked.

  The woman chose a chair with its back to the wall. ‘You have meeting with my friend on train yesterday. His name is Sergei. He is killed afterward.’

  ‘Oh!’ gasped Akiko, her hand in front of her lips.

  ‘Killed?’ Ben echoed, stunned.

  ‘What did you talk about?’ the woman demanded.

  ‘The Lub-Lubyanka,’ Akiko stuttered.

  ‘What did you want to know?’

  ‘We asked him about prisoners.’

  ‘What prisoners?’

  ‘He told us about an American politician brought to the Lubyanka in 1983,’ said Ben. ‘We asked him about survivors of Korean Air Lines Flight 007.’

  The woman shook her head, but seemed to relax a little. ‘He tell me about your foolish advertisement and ask me to keep watch on his back. I see men follow you, and Sergei. I follow men who follow Sergei. I see Sergei killed.’

  ‘Jesus,’ Ben whispered.

  ‘My friend want to help you. And now I honor his memory by telling you to go home, back to America.’

  ‘We can’t,’ said Akiko.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘We are looking for someone.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Someone taken prisoner.’

  ‘Forget about this person. Also, your room is bugged with listening device.’

  ‘What?’ Akiko was shocked.

  ‘What did the killer look like?’ asked Ben. ‘In case he comes after us.’

  ‘Tall, thin, bald. His name is Vlahd Bykovski.’

  ‘You know him?’

  ‘He was my husband. Do not take elevator, use stairs. Stairs take longer than elevator. You do not want them to know that we have talked. Do not discuss things you do not want known in your room.’ The woman stood. ‘For health, leave Russia now.’

  She turned and walked out without looking back. Somewhere down the hall, out of sight, a door opened and closed. Ben and Akiko continued to sit, overwhelme
d.

  Akiko moved first. Ben followed her down the stairs, through the foyer and into the street. It was snowing. Neither talked for a block and a half.

  ‘Are we being followed?’ Ben finally asked, glancing behind him but seeing nothing in the least suspicious.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Akiko. ‘We should take her advice and leave.’

  ‘And go home?’

  ‘No, go to Khabarovsk.’

  ‘Why did you kill him?’ Valentin Korolenko asked. He gazed down onto the roof of the Bolshoi Theatre. A copy of the Izvestiya lay on the low coffee table, opened to a grainy, long-distance photo of a police cordon around the Plaza Mediterrano, where the body of retired FSB sergeant Sergei Glazkov had been found.

  ‘The subjects were getting nowhere and then my ex-wife’s lover volunteered to be their tour guide through the basement cells of the Lubyanka.’

  ‘I know of your history with Glazkov, Vlahd Ivanovich. I am not paying you to settle old family scores.’

  ‘If I hadn’t killed him, who knows what he might have told them?’

  ‘Nevertheless, you don’t have carte blanche on my account to leave a trail of bodies from one end of the Rodino to another. How did Glazkov connect with our two tourists?’

  ‘They placed an ad. Sergei answered it.’

  ‘An advertisement?’ Korolenko shook his head. ‘Americans . . .’

  He picked up the newspaper. The article said the police believed Sergei Glazkov’s death to have been an unfortunate accident. It wasn’t uncommon for falling icicles to cause death, and no witnesses had come forward to report any crime. Korolenko gave a mental shrug. Perhaps, as Bykovski was saying, the man was better off dead, at least for them.

  ‘Where is Soloyov?’ asked Korolenko.

  ‘Grisha’s following our targets.’

  ‘Well then, perhaps you should rejoin him.’

  Lana pressed the button beneath the security camera. A green light came on.

  ‘Lana Englese, NSA, and Special Agent Miller Sherwood, FBI, to see Mr Lucas Watts,’ she said, holding their credentials up to the camera lens.

  ‘Do you have an appointment?’ asked a female voice through the speaker.

  ‘Do we need one?’ was Lana’s response.

  ‘Just a moment, please.’

  The light went off. A moment later, there was a buzz and Lana pushed the gate open. The cinder path leading to the front steps of the house was almost the width of a driveway. The front door, also, was wide enough for three people abreast to walk through. It reminded her of the elephant pen at a zoo she once visited as a child.

  They stood at the front door. There was another camera and buzzer. The light was green. They were being checked again. Lana turned her back to the camera and took in the surroundings. The front garden was expertly manicured grass. The flamingos were pure cheese. The thick screen of pines and the fence spoke of neatness and privacy issues, maybe even paranoia.

  The door opened on a vast man stuffed into a motorized chair. His hair was short and greasy and his spectacles were on the verge of being pushed off his face by his cheeks.

  ‘Good afternoon,’ said Lana, holding up her ID. ‘I’m Investigator Englese and this—’

  ‘Yeah, I got it the first time,’ said Watts. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Can we come in?’ she asked.

  ‘Nope,’ he said.

  Behind Watts, Lana could see his nurse—attractive in a blonde Swedish way; the voice on the security speaker. She looked well paid. From what the woman probably had to do, she’d have to be, Lana thought. The dimensions of Watts explained the modifications to his home. He’d obviously spent a small fortune remodeling. The webzine scene had to be lucrative.

  ‘You. You’re staring,’ Watts snapped at Sherwood. ‘What’s to stare at? We won’t be talking to you.’

  Before her partner could retaliate, Lana said, ‘Mr Watts, e-Fuzz is yours, am I right?’

  ‘It certainly is.’

  ‘It’s carrying an article in the current issue that looks at the construction of analog algorithms.’

  ‘That’s correct.’

  ‘The particular algorithm in the article was the one used to encrypt radar cross-sections detected by Raytheon AN/SPS-32 long-distance radars, one of which was located at Wakkanai on the Japanese Island of Hokkaido in 1983.’

  ‘What of it? The algorithm was declassified years ago, and the US and its allies employed that radar system extensively for years. It’s common. Or, I should say, it was common.’

  ‘Mr Watts, you recently had a visit from an old buddy of yours—Mr Dallas Mitchell,’ Lana said. ‘He brought along some friends. They wanted you to decrypt a tape. You cracked it. Your article is proof of that. The United States government wants that tape back.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘You do, and so do we. The NSA has taken you to court several times over the years. Now the laws are tougher, the penalties harsher. You can’t win them all, Mr Watts. You’ve created a comfortable world for yourself here, sir. You wouldn’t be so comfortable out of it.’

  ‘Turn up with the police and a search warrant, Ms Englese. Then you can come in, have a look around for yourself. I don’t have the tape, but, as you’ve observed, I’ve seen what’s on it. Trust me, the United States does not want to take me to court on this one. Now, if there are no other questions?’

  The interview was getting away from her. She asked the first question that popped into her head. ‘Tex Mitchell. Where can we reach him? Do you know where he is?’

  ‘I have no idea. Now, if you’ll excuse me, this interview is concluded.’

  The giant man reversed and disappeared into the gloom like a whale diving deep.

  ‘Thank you for your time, sir,’ Lana called after him, working hard to keep the frustration out of her voice.

  The blonde woman reappeared and closed the door without looking at them.

  Lana stood on the front steps and watched Sherwood walk down the path, uninterested. The tape . . . I’ve seen what’s on it. Trust me, the United States does not want to take me to court on this one.

  February 8, 2012

  Khabarovsk, Siberia. The cab driver lifted his head with a sneering grunt, which Ben and Akiko assumed meant that he’d agreed to the fare. The taxi was a large Japanese people-mover with a crack in the wind-shield that ran the width of the glass. The driver smoked and wound his window down a few inches to spit.

  They pulled out of the frozen airport parking lot in the shadow of a gray marble Soviet building. The road to the city took them past skeletal black trees and crumbling tenement apartment buildings with frozen washing hanging rigid from lines strung between the windows.

  ‘I counted six tall, thin bald men on the plane who looked like killers,’ Ben said. ‘And one of them was the pilot.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Akiko with a smile. She sat beside him in the rear seat buried beneath half a dozen layers of clothing. ‘I looked for him, too.’

  ‘How far is it to the hotel?’

  ‘The driver said ten minutes.’

  Ben turned around and peered out the back window. There were cars behind them, but were they being followed? What are you expecting, he asked himself. He looked again. The vehicle behind them was a silver Toyota wagon. There were no apes in trench coats hanging out the windows with submachine guns. They were on the main road connecting the airport to the town, and another antiquated passenger jet had landed only minutes after theirs, packing out the arrivals hall. Ben told himself that the tension he felt was lack of sleep. It had been a red-eye flight and he was shattered. The back of his seat on the plane had separated from the frame, providing no support. It was an ancient aircraft, a real Cold War antique. The interior smelled like he imagined an old Times Square porn theatre might and the rubber matting in the toilet floor had stuck to the bottom of his shoes. The engines had made some strange sounds, too, which began when they were on the tarmac at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo
Airport, the fan blades grinding in their bearings as the frigid wind blew through them.

  Khabarovsk bumped by out the window, its citizens mostly dressed in black with black hats, heads down, picking their way across the icy broken sidewalks. It gave the impression of a provincial town down on its luck. The buildings looked like their maintenance managers had been on strike for forty years. The rows of tenements were punctuated by houses made of wood, blackened like the trees by the ferocity of the elements, one-room homes each with a chimney exhaling a thin tendril of smoke, a last gasp.

  ‘Does our hotel have a heated pool?’ Ben asked as a shiver rippled through him.

  Akiko was flicking through a guidebook. ‘No, but it says here that hot water for the showers can mostly be expected.’

  ‘Mostly?’ he said. ‘Reassuring.’

  The cab driver took the road slowly, avoiding occasional patches of black ice. Eventually, the traffic behind them thinned out, and by the time they pulled into the access road to a building that looked like a block of iron slag with window slots, they were on their own.

  ‘That’s our hotel?’ Ben asked.

  ‘Da, da. Is hotel,’ said the driver.

  The cab pulled into a parking space beyond the front doors. The driver counted the notes Ben handed him. He then leaned forward, pulled the release on the trunk, sat back in his seat and lit another cigarette.

  ‘The Russians haven’t quite got this whole service-with-a-smile thing worked out, have they?’ Ben said as he pulled their bags from the trunk.

  He saw the corners of Akiko’s eyes crinkle in acknowledgement as she took her pack’s handle and lugged it to the doorway, an airlock with glass doors at both ends. They walked into a foyer empty of guests. Two bull-necked men in charcoal pants and cheap jackets stood inside the doorway like nightclub security expecting trouble.

  Ben and Akiko walked to the reception desk, which was occupied by a woman in a red knitted sweater with red lipstick and badly tea-stained teeth. She ignored them for several minutes.

  ‘Akiko Sato and Benjamin Harbor,’ said Akiko eventually. ‘We have a reservation.’

  The woman checked her computer terminal before responding. ‘Passports,’ she said, making no eye contact, holding her hand out across the counter.